bit of a noob question here...but need to settle an argument between my flatmate and i

does uploading usually contribute to your download quota? i.e. if your uploading while downloading torrents, does this effectively double (or whatever) the size of your download?

Depends on the policy of your isp.

with torrents, I've found uploading does affect download quota but only slightly. I assume it would be just requests coming in from other clients for pieces of the file your uploading etc

They're both right. BigPond and probably a few other ISPs still count uploaded data in your monthly allowance so all uploads contribute to your plan cap. Most DSL providers ie: iinet, internode, netspace etc don't count uploads at all.

If all you're doing is seeding a torrent there will be small amounts of downstream as your machine communicates with the others. It's reletively miniscule though and would only amount to a couple of MB a week, tops.

as an example to what dan said ive run my torrent program for the last hour,

ive uploaded 396mb and downloaded 2.5mb just from my machine talking to the leechers.

Based on very rough* calculations you could assume that for every amount you download, maybe 5% of that figure will be consumed in replies.

So download 20GB, and you've uploaded 1GB.

(* = very, very rough)

ive uploaded 396mb and downloaded 2.5mb just from my machine talking to the leechers.

That's probably just the payload, and doesn't take into account headers?

It'd be safe to bet that a reply packet would be 90%+ header, hence your real downloaded figure should be higher.

last edited by parabol at 17:59:08 27/Apr/07

only if you are with a s*** joke isp

mines unlimited.

























But I'm on dial-up :(


P.S. I <3 spook

of course you do :)

it's TPG

:( ?

Optarse has unlimited uploads, but if you upload a huge amount they send you emails threatening to suspend your account or something like that.

I got kicked off dialup for downloading too much.... twice.

Optarse has unlimited uploads, but if you upload a huge amount they send you emails threatening

So it's not really unlimited.

Unlimited****^+%#

TPG doesn't count Uploads towards your quota, but uploading torrents will involve a small amount of downloading.

It's still a fair ammount, you preety much have to be downloading everyday, and since Optus has a max upload rate of roughly 30kbp/s..

Crackaveli did about 30gig in one month before he got warned.

With my ISP if I upload more than I download then my quota is applied to that, for example on my 14Gb plan if I upload 10Gb and download 2Gb then I only have 4Gb of uploads left or 12Gb of downloads*.

* Left out ACKs, etc to make the example easier.

I got kicked off dialup for downloading too much.... twice.

That's fkn ridiculous they should reward you for your patience in downloading so much on dial up. Seriously though someone should ban the cnts from naming a service as "Unlimited" and limiting it.

On the smaller seeded torrents, which you're still a peer, I would think headers are less likely to consume as many resources as it would be more efficient for BT to take advantage of TCP piggyback acking between each point; Once you get to the larger seeds/peers then it's likely the point to point connections are strictly asymmetrical in traffic and yes headers would cost lots more in *hidden* traffic.

awesome. thanks fellas

Telstra includes uploads, Optus does not.
I can't recall whether or not iiNet includes uploads in the quota, but I suspect upload is unmetered.

iinet doesnt count uploads

AFAIK Telstra is the market leader in ripping users off by counting uploads.